Ford, Holden or VW ??

[Vik351]

Toot the family to a top fueler to AIR when Bobby let us still use it ...

Well superman here thought "I DONT NEED NO STINKIN EAR PLUGS " OMFG ...

Was wrong about that , we was up on da hill ... Just after it took off ...

Inexplainable until you have seen one, the idle is bad enough

vik...

[Greynomad]

Went to Castlereagh when I was about 15 — without earplugs.
Some Yanks doing demo runs in their fancied-up rails.
One looked like it had been designed by Big Daddy Roth (for those who remember his cartoon car creations)!
Gold metalflake conical body with another gold cone over the cockpit.
It took about 4 days for my hearing to return to normal.
Exciting as hell for a 15yo though…

[supersparky]

I watched the Formula E racecars on TV for a while, this arvo. It was bearable with the sound down. I hope that they catch on eventually, if for no more than good feedback and research. I don't like hearing the VFD's screaming and whatever it is to get the regenerative brakes happening.
It's not quite the same as ICE's, yet. Maybe some day.

[Noggins]

Went to Castlereagh when I was about 15 — without earplugs.
Some Yanks doing demo runs in their fancied-up rails.
One looked like it had been designed by Big Daddy Roth (for those who remember his cartoon car creations)!
Gold metalflake conical body with another gold cone over the cockpit.
It took about 4 days for my hearing to return to normal.
Exciting as hell for a 15yo though…

When I was a lot younger I was into HotRods and drag racing in Victoria
Did some time on the old Traceys Speedway with a modified 32 Ford with sidevalve , Mann that car unmolested would be worth a Mint these days, Then I joined a group that did the 1/4 mile at the Bob Jane track for a while, standing at the tree you really did need earmuffs I think that's where my ears protested and don't work so good since then.
Then along with all this was a Prez of Southern Beaches Rod and Custom for a while, till I went to WA for work.
Spent a motza of $$$$ and made some good memories in the process.


Ron

[BernieQ2]

I watched the Formula E racecars on TV for a while, this arvo. It was bearable with the sound down. I hope that they catch on eventually, if for no more than good feedback and research. I don't like hearing the VFD's screaming and whatever it is to get the regenerative brakes happening.
It's not quite the same as ICE's, yet. Maybe some day.

Did you see the formula one car go around Bathurst yesterday Dave ?
Revved out to 18,000...I don't think my Nissan can beat that
Bernie.

[Greynomad]

When I was about 10 dad took me to a hillclimb where a friend of his was competing on a (then) very rare imported Japanese motorcycle. It was a six-speed 50cc Honda (with competition fairings) & friend had entered as “Scuderia Eggeni”, cause he reckoned he could fill the only cylinder by cracking an egg in it.
Friend reckoned the powerband kicked in at 14,000 revs, & dropped off a cliff at 14,200.

He won his class… entry list of one.

[T1 Terry]

Toot the family to a top fueler to AIR when Bobby let us still use it ...

Well superman here thought "I DONT NEED NO STINKIN EAR PLUGS " OMFG ...

Was wrong about that , we was up on da hill ... Just after it took off ...

Inexplainable until you have seen one, the idle is bad enough

vik...

The ear damaging noise is the exhaust breaking the sound barrier every 2nd eng revolution x 8 cyls and they launch and maintain around 10,000rpm for the 1/4 mile, more than 40,000 times in a single run. The blue flame isn't excess fuel being burnt, the engine would explode if there was still liquid fuel when the piston reached top dead centre. The blue flame is the heat separating hydrogen and oxygen from the water in the air and then igniting it, adding to the noise level ....... it just requires energy to separate water to oxygen and hydrogen, that can be electrical, heat or pressure, the combined heat and pressure leaving the tips of the exhaust pipes splits the water molecules into their 2 parts and the heat ignites it ...... Castlereagh was the first time I saw a rail run with nitro in the fuel, nothing like the 95% they run now, but it produced the blue tip flame from the exhaust pipes ...... even the jet powered rails couldn't equal that spectacular ......

Calder Park Drag way at the winter nationals has so much moisture in the air on the night runs the exhaust from side by side passes cross in the centre and make a blue VW symbol, the light blue cone forms the V and the darker blue flame forms the W ..... the noise, sceptical and pressure wave is just something you never forget ......

T1 Terry

[Greynomad]

T1,
At the Castlreagh drags I attended that day, some of the Yanks were running hydrazine.
Earlier, in the USA, someone had left a can alongside their Top Fueller for about 20 minutes then fired up the engine.
The can exploded.
Investigation determined that sound pressure had ruptured the crystal crust which formed on the liquid and that was enough to ignite the whole thing.
At Castlereagh they kept the hydrazine in a cool box, but on one run the engine blew.
They found the top half of one bank of four cylinders 500 yards from the track… 🫢
After that, hydrazine was banned from use.

[supersparky]

Now the top fuellers use nitro-methane as fuel, and that where the cackle and the purple exhaust comes from.
Looks pretty specks at night. Sounds great anytime.

[T1 Terry]

When a top fueller flames out it causes a hydraulic lock, 4 injectors per cyl are pumping in fuel and 2 fuel pumps supply them to keep up the pressure. There is a special blanket come restraining strap that goes over the supercharger and around the upper section of the engine in an attempt to keep it all in the vehicle when it goes bang. On a final side by side pass on the old Eastern Creek drag strip, one let go and sent the blower and head into the fence separating the spectators from the track, the force was so great it snapped the Kevlar straps. The whole security blanket idea was revised after that, if it had been the other side head that escaped, it would have hit the driver of the rail that was beside him at the time.
The next top fuel meeting, in the final again, a clutch and flywheel departed from the rear of the engine and went over the heads of the spectators on the hill beside the grandstand and landed out on the road beside the race complex ...... milli seconds later and it would have gone into the grandstand ..... the bellhousing scatter sheilds were revised after that incident.
Further investigation into just what was happening before the explosions uncovered a now banned practice of having a bypass supply that had no fuel restrictors (known as pills) in the fuel lines to the injectors directly over the intake valves ..... The driver had the option of hitting this button at the end of the run if they thought they needed the extra power to win and they believed the engine would stay together for the last second or less.
The over fuel in the first instance blew out the homogeneous flame in the cyls on one side (the spark plugs are melted by the 60 ft mark, under a second from the launch) the clutch and flywheel disintegration was the result of the pressure plate not being able to apply enough clamping force on the clutch plates resulting in massive clutch slip.
That last throw of the dice button is still available (the yanks call it a scramble button) but the amount of added fuel is limited to 10% now .... well that was the rule back when I was still involved in drag racing.

The next big bang was in a Sainty Racing engine, built in sections so the block each side was seperate to the crank case and naturally the heads, all billet machined from aircraft grade aluminium blocks, so no cooling jackets at all. The whole upper section of the engine came away from the crankcase section, very spectacular, they cleaned up the mess from that and a few passes later, a Keith Black engine threw the crankshaft out the bottom of the block and into the race track disintegrating the rear section of the rail leaving the driver and front section still going forward in one direction, the back half that remained went up in the air and across the other lane, fortunately the other rail was far enough in front when it landed to avoid it.
They blamed the atmospheric conditions for those two events, not the fact there was huge prize money offered for the first 4 second pass

T1 Terry